Postnatal Depression Support & Therapy in London

Dr Kate Watchorn is an HCPC accredited Clinical Psychologist and Cognitive Behavioural Therapist. She completed her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology at University College London (UCL) and has since gained extensive experience working across NHS specialist services, private practice, and family focused settings.

Kate offers therapy for children, adolescents, and adults, with a particular interest in the emotional wellbeing of families during key developmental transitions. Her work is informed by a deep understanding of family systems, developmental psychology, and trauma informed care.

She is a highly skilled clinician who has received further trainings in specialist therapeutic modalities including Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing, Compassion Focused Therapy, and Couples Therapy for Depression. As such, she is able to work in a structured yet flexible way, integrating evidence based models with a strong focus on each client’s individualised goals.

Across all areas of her practice, Kate is recognised for her warm, compassionate, and collaborative style.

Adult Mental Health Specialism

Kate is an experienced adult psychologist who provides therapy for individuals experiencing anxiety, depression, stress, relationship difficulties, low self esteem, and significant life transitions.

Kate’s approach is relational and reflective, helping clients explore the roots of their difficulties and understand how past experiences shape current patterns. Therapy often involves gently exploring the safety strategies that may have helped in the past but may now be keeping things stuck. Alongside this depth focused work, Kate also offers skills based interventions with a focus on developing practical coping strategies in the here-and-now to manage symptoms and move towards meaningful change.

She has a particular interest and expertise in working with the impacts of unresolved childhood trauma, relational difficulties, self criticism, and low self esteem. Her style is warm, collaborative, and grounded in a deep understanding of how early experiences shape adult wellbeing.

“I really valued and appreciated the structure that Kate gave this work – it helped me see that the issues that felt overwhelming could be broken down into more manageable pieces and that by chipping away at each of these I could get results. Kate was always clear at the start and end of sessions about what we were working on, what the work between sessions should be and how we were progressing. This was hugely helpful. I wanted to thank Kate from the bottom of my heart for her empathy, kindness, astute insight and expert. She is brilliant!”
Former Client

Dr Camilla Cookson is a specialist Child and Adolescent Clinical Psychologist. She has 10 years of clinical experience working across various mental health settings within the NHS, with a current position as a Senior Clinical Psychologist in a London Community Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (CAMHS). She is registered with the Health and Care Professionals Council (HCPC).

Camilla obtained a First-Class degree in Experimental Psychology at Oxford University and went on to complete her doctoral training in Clinical Psychology at Royal Holloway, University of London. It was during this time that Camilla developed her passion for working with children, young people and their families, where she has focussed her work since.

Camilla’s experience reflects the great variety that comes with working with children, and includes individual, family, parenting, school-based and consultative work across a range of presenting needs, covering the following:

• Attachment Difficulties
• Behaviours that Challenge  
• Depression 
• Generalised Anxiety Disorder
• Health Anxiety
• Low Self Esteem
• Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Panic Disorder
• Parenting
• Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Complex PTSD
• Separation Anxiety
• Social Anxiety Disorder

Camilla understands that building a trusting, supportive and open therapeutic relationship is of great importance, and enjoys working creatively and compassionately in order to engage the young person to work in collaboration towards achieving their personal goals. Camilla also recognises the value of working together with family and any other important people/systems in a child’s life where appropriate.

Camilla has experience undertaking complex assessments and understands the benefit of reaching a comprehensive shared understanding of the presenting concerns in order to achieve positive therapeutic outcomes. Within her therapeutic work, she draws on a variety of evidence based psychological therapies and models to best meet the needs of her clients, including Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Mindfulness-Based approaches, Behavioural and Parenting work (including Personalised Individual Parent Training, PIPT), and Family and Narrative interventions.

Camilla has additionally undertaken training in specialist trauma therapies, including Trauma-Focused CBT, Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) and Narrative Exposure Therapy for Children (KIDNET), developing her interest and experience in this area through working within a specialist NHS service supporting children, young people and their families who have been affected by trauma. She also has experience undertaking cognitive assessments and working with children with additional neurodevelopmental needs. 

“Dr Cookson worked with us with a great amount of interest and involvement which was showed by her preparedness, by thoroughly understanding our emotions and working in a structured way so we could see a change. She asked us our input in the very beginning in terms of our expectations and was open to take it onboard.” Former Client

Dr Allison Hayes is the Founder and Clinical Director of the Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic. Dr Hayes is a highly respected Consultant Clinical Psychologist who has acquired a wealth of clinical experience and a track record of delivering high-quality services, having worked with an international client group in the private sector for 20-years.

Dr Hayes completed an undergraduate degree in Psychology with first class honours and later went on to be awarded her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology. She worked in the NHS and founded her private practice in 2003. The Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic has grown out of her pursuit of establishing a centre of clinical excellence, which provides outpatient care for individuals and families with mental health challenges and emotional needs.

Dr Hayes is an optimistic, compassionate and kind psychologist who is committed to working with patients to facilitate and achieve change. She has expertise working with adolescents and adults with emotional difficulties and those with a diagnosis of personality disorder, and is further experienced in supporting individuals who present with:

• Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
• Adjustment Disorder
• Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
• Addiction
• Adult Survivors of Childhood Trauma
• Bereavement
• Bipolar Disorder
• Depression
• Eating Disorders
• Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
• Health Anxiety
• Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Personality Disorders
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
• Psychosis

Dr Hayes has trained in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Mindfulness-Based Therapies, Compassion-Focused Therapy, The MANTRA model for Eating Disorders, Narrative Therapy, Motivational Interviewing, Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing therapy (EMDR), Radically-Open Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (RO-DBT) and Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT).

Dr Hayes has been highly influential in the development of services for Eating Disorders and group programmes for a range of disorders. She is an experienced clinical supervisor of psychology colleagues, and delivers regular multi-disciplinary training on all aspects of mental health and psychology. Dr Hayes has facilitated a range of corporate training programmes on Stress and Emotional First Aid in the workplace.

Dr Hayes oversees recruitment of all professionals to the Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic to ensure the highest clinical standards in treatment. She promotes that all work undertaken at the Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic is grounded in evidence-based practice, is adherent to the NICE guidelines, establishes treatment efficacy, and reflects the principles of the Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic.

“I am extremely grateful for the care Allison showed me during our sessions. She always adapted sessions to match my needs and demonstrated a real understanding of the difficulties I was facing. Her openness and kindness meant that trust was developed very quickly, and I would have no hesitation in seeing her again should I ever need to.” Former Client

• Anxiety Disorders
• Behaviours that Challenge
• Depression
• Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD)
• Health Anxiety
• Life transitions (including school transitions)
• Low Self-Esteem
• Loss and Bereavement
• Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD)
• Panic Disorder
• Parental Illness
• Parenting difficulties
• Perfectionism
• Perinatal Trauma
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
• Relationship Difficulties
• Self-Harm
• Sexual Abuse and Trauma
• Specific Phobias
• Stress and burnout

Dr Nadia Khan is Clinical Psychologist and accredited Cognitive Behavior Therapist. She has worked across various mental health settings within the NHS and the charitable sector for over ten years.  

Nadia completed her undergraduate degree in Politics and International Relations at The University of Manchester, before steering towards a career in psychology. She achieved a Masters with distinction in Educational Psychology, followed by a Post Graduate Certificate in Mental Health Practice. She then completed her training in Cognitive Behavioral Therapies (PGDip) at the prestigious Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience (IOPPN; Kings College University) before undertaking her doctoral training in Clinical Psychology from Royal Holloway, University of London.  

At the core of Nadia’s therapeutic approach is to provide an empathic, safe and open space, thus enabling clients to develop awareness and understanding of complex psychological patterns and problems. Nadia uses this basic foundation to help clients (and the systems around them) work through these challenges by applying appropriate, evidenced-based intervention models in a gentle and collaborative way. She believes that while life can bring tragedy, traumas and other adversity, therapy can help people and families find compassion, strength and hope; supporting them to cultivate and grow from these experiences and offering a path to a happier and more settled existence. 

Nadia currently specialises in working with women, infants and their families during the perinatal period (pregnancy and the first two years post birth). Alongside her work at the Fitzrovia Psychology Clinic, she works as a Senior Clinical Psychologist in a Specialist Perinatal NHS service. She has experience working with post-natal depression, anxiety (including post-natal OCD, panic disorder etc), birth trauma, post-partum psychosis, personality disorder/complex trauma, implications of birth injury to mothers/infants and also issues related to maternal mental health (including infertility, miscarriage, infant loss/stillbirth).  

Prior to her work in perinatal mental health, Nadia worked in child and adolescent mental health providing evidenced based care to young people and their families, particularly adolescents engaging in self-harm and experiencing emotional dysregulation. She also has extensive experience working psychologically with adults, including working within a primary care setting (IAPT), providing both via individual and group support. 

Nadia has a strong interest in the implications of culture, race and ethnicity within mental health and upon the therapeutic process.  She has worked extensively with clients from diverse cultural backgrounds to ensure they are seen, held and nurtured; where previously they may have felt alienated or misunderstood. She is passionate about working towards intersectional and anti-racist therapeutic practice and has links with the South Asian Therapy networks in the UK. 

Nadia is an integrative psychologist and draws on a range of evidence-based psychological models and interventions including Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), Compassion-Focused Therapy (CFT), Narrative Therapy, Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT). She is currently undergoing training in Eye Movement De-Sensitisation and Reprocessing Therapy (EMDR).  

She has experience and training in the treatment of:  

• Anxiety Disorders 
• Depression 
• Generalised Anxiety Disorder (GAD) 
• Low Self-Esteem
• Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) 
• Panic Disorder 
• Perinatal Trauma
• Personality Disorders 
• Post-Partum Psychosis
• Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) 
• Social Anxiety Disorder (SAD)